My 2003 Ford Ranger service manual weighs about eight pounds. What happens when the company stops hosting the PDF for a 2043 model? You just lose access to the knowledge forever. That feels like planned obsolescence for information. At least a book on a shelf can't get a takedown notice.
Wait, your manual is eight pounds? That's insane, I mean I knew old car books were big but that's like a small dog. Spencerross makes a good point though, my dad has a stack of repair guides from the 90s in his garage and they're still there when he needs them. If my truck's manual was just a PDF and the link went dead, I'd be totally stuck trying to fix anything. It's scary to think about losing all that info because someone decided to take it offline.